By Bill Miller Jr.Record PublisherA Marthasville resident and veteran prosecutor was sworn in as the 13th prosecuting attorney for Warren County on Friday.Jennifer A. Bartlett has the distinction of being the first woman to hold the position.Bartlett, 40, was appointed last Wednesday by Gov. Jay Nixon to lead the office she once worked in as an assistant.She was selected to fill the vacancy created by the recent appointment of former Prosecuting Attorney Michael S. Wright as associate circuit judge for Warren County. Wright was the county prosecutor since 1991.Bartlett said her appointment fulfills a career goal she had since at least high school.“I always wanted to be a prosecutor,” she said Tuesday. “This is a great opportunity to achieve that goal. I am taking over an office that is very competent. I would describe it as a well-oiled machine. Mike (Wright) did an excellent job here and I hope to continue that tradition and build on what he has done.”Bartlett, a Republican, served as an assistant prosecuting attorney for Warren County from 2000 to 2002. Since then, she has worked as an assistant prosecuting attorney for Franklin County. In that capacity she has tried a number of first-degree murder cases and other serious felonies, including rape and child molestation cases.She was the lead attorney in the highly publicized Vernell Loggins murder trial. The Pacific truck driver was accused of murdering and dismembering his girlfriend in 2009. A Franklin County jury convicted Loggins and sentenced him to death. A circuit judge later commuted the sentence and ordered a life prison term for Loggins.Bartlett also served as the treatment court prosecutor for Franklin County, where she assisted in developing guidelines and protocol for the treatment courts, and assisted the drug court team with the implementation of a DWI court.Prior to serving as a prosecutor in Warren and Franklin counties, Bartlett worked as an attorney in private practice and as a state public defender from 1999 to 2000. From 2001 to 2011, she was an instructor at the Eastern Missouri Law Enforcement Academy.“I’m really happy for her,” Franklin County Prosecuting Attorney Bob parks said. “I hate to see her go. She did an excellent job for me and handled some high-profile cases. But she is going to do a great job for the people in Warren County.”Bartlett earned both her undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Missouri. She was born and raised in St. Charles but moved to Marthasville about nine years ago.She is married to a former police officer who recently left a career in law enforcement to start his own foam insulation business based out of Marthasville. The couple have three children ages, 16, 10 and 8.Bartlett said one of her goals as prosecutor is to assist the office in the adoption of new technology.“The new E-filing system is coming to the county in June and I would like to see us make the transition as smoothly as possible,” she said. “We need to use the technology to streamline our processes and hopefully make us more efficient, especially as we relate to other law enforcement agencies and the victims of crimes. No one likes change, it can be scary. But as technology advances, we have to adapt.”The Warren County Prosecuting Attorney is an elective office and the position will be on the November ballot. Bartlett said she will file for the office on the Republican ticket.

BARTLETT SWORN IN Jennifer A. Bartlett, of Marthasville, was sworn in as the new Prosecuting Attorney for Warren County Friday afternoon. Administering the oath was Presiding Circuit Judge Wesley Dalton. Chris Orlet photo.